The same. — 'And He has girded me about with His scourges.' 39. The weak members of the Church are troubled by continual scourges. — For it is one thing to be struck with scourges, another to be girded with them. We are struck with scourges when even in our sorrows we have consolation from other things. But when so great an affliction presses us down that the soul can find no breathing-space from the consolation of anything, then we are no longer merely borne along by scourges, but are girded about, because we are surrounded on every side by the lash of tribulations. Paul had been girded with scourges when he said: 'Fightings without, fears within' (2 Cor. 7:5). He had been girded with scourges when he said: 'In perils from my own race, in perils from the Gentiles, in perils in the city, in perils in the wilderness' (2 Cor.
11:26), and the rest, which he so enumerates as to show that he had nowhere any rest. But when holy Church is girded with the scourges of her tribulations, in her all the weak are reduced to a state of faintheartedness, so that they think themselves already despised in proportion as they see themselves the more slowly heard. Rightly is it further added, still under their figure, in the voice of the holy man: